That’s Coca-Cola, not cocaine. I have seen people get into fist-fights over bottles of Coke.

The list goes on. Low self-esteem. Stigma in many forms. Phobias and irrational fears.

Hypnotherapy can correct all of these nasties and more, and with problems like these under better control, and your quality of life therefore improving, you can better use your own resources to deal with the mental illness. Furthermore, the positive experience of reducing or conquering these difficulties can help improve your outlook. Perhaps you can shift from “Oh no, not another day of the same old” to “things are a little better than yesterday”.

The positive change may be a small step. In some cases, it may be several small steps adding up to a big stride, or a single large step. What these steps are, will be different for each individual. One of the joys of practice is being able to tailor a solution for just that person, and with their full knowledge and cooperation.

Therapy can also be applied to aspects of the mental illness. “What is it particularly that bothers you” I can ask my patients.

For instance, two people with Bipolar Disorder, with the same symptoms, may be bothered by different aspects. “I hate being so irritable” says one person. “It drives my partner crazy”. Then we can work on strategies to address that. Rob taught me that everyone has resources and strengths. Using hypnosis, we search for strengths to deal with particular problems.

I am proud to offer an approach that is strengths-based and individually focussed. I will conclude with an example, then invite questions.

Kristy example.

My friend Kristy had bitten her nails, continuously, since the age of 9 months. Having helped her with a number of hypnotic inductions, and now familiar with the technique, Kristy found a YouTube video on stopping nail-biting using hypnosis. After just one session using this video, she stopped nail biting. This was at the end of last year, when aged 34. A couple of months ago, Kristy cut her nails, for the first time in her life. Kristy is justifiably proud of this.